Wednesday, October 19, 2016

Luke 10:41-42 -- On Trouble and Priority

"And Jesus answered and said unto her, Martha, Martha, thou art careful and troubled about many things;
But one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her."
Luke 10:41-42

I was reading this today and I was struck by how universal this advice is. We're all careful and troubled about so many things, but how many of them really matter in the long term? What truly matters is Christ, the gospel--learning and preparing ourselves for eternity.

This isn't to say that we should just blow off all of our responsibilities, or stop earning a living. :) But Christ makes it very clear here that Mary made a good choice, and I think that means that sometimes we need to let go of the stress and the worry and concentrate on the "peaceable things" of the gospel (D&C 42:61). I don't think that we have to remove anything essential from our lives, but it probably does mean that we need to redefine essential, and perhaps set better priorities.

We can lighten our load, and make more room for Christ in our lives, if we let go of things that don't matter and prioritize the gospel. In fact, I think as we learn to put God first, we'll find that we are less troubled in general, and that we have even more time in our lives for other things that do matter. Today, let's think about the things that are distracting us from God, and maybe get rid of a few of them. Let's start moving closer to God, and making sure he is at the top of the list.

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The scriptural commentary presented here is based on books of scripture recognized by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, so you'll see scriptures from several books like the Bible, the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants, etc.

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